5 Best Bluetooth Headphones for Biking in 2024

Even if you already own a pair of fitness-oriented headphones, there’s a good reason why you should still get another pair just for biking. And if you don’t own any headphones suitable for active use, the reasons are numerous.

ProductBrandNamePrice
31TYkfOKqNL. SL500JaybirdJaybird X3 in-Ear Wireless Bluetooth Sports HeadphonesCheck Price on Amazon
31rZugw8bTL. SL500AftershokzAftershokz AS600IG Trekz Titanium Open Ear Wireless Bone Conduction Headphones, Ivy GreenCheck Price on Amazon
4123Y3ntDKL. SL500PlantronicsPlantronics BackBeat Fit Bluetooth Headphones - BlackCheck Price on Amazon
41P3YJAHQaL. SL500UrbanearsUrbanears Hellas On-Ear Active Wireless Bluetooth Headphones, Rush (4091226)Check Price on Amazon

* If you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. For more details, please visit our Privacy policy page.

What kind of features do you expect fitness-oriented headphones to have? Most people want excellent comfort, water and sweat resistance, long battery life, and noise isolation, and that’s exactly what most headphone manufacturers deliver.

What’s the problem? The problem is that the last thing you want is not to be able to hear oncoming traffic, other cyclists, pedestrians, police, and ambulance sirens. This could include other potential hazards that you’re inevitably going to come across at some during just about any bike ride. In other words, you don’t want your headphones to isolate too much sound.

Fortunately, two kinds of fitness-oriented headphones offer all the features consumers desire but isolate very little outside noise: the two kinds are open-back headphones and bone conduction headphones.

If you don’t know, open-back headphones are headphones with a perforated enclosure, allowing the air to reach your eardrums freely. As a nice bonus, open-back headphones tend to sound, well, more open.

Bone conduction headphones conduct sound to the inner ear through the bones of the skull. The technology has been employed by many hearing aids for some time now. It has been recently finding its way into consumer electronics as well, most notably with the release of the Google Glass.

In this article, we list the top 5 best Bluetooth headphones for biking in 2018, including something for the fans of bone conduction headphones and open-back headphones alike.

314 tbmot3L

Aftershokz Trekz Titanium

The Aftershokz Trekz Titanium is the most popular bone conduction headphones on the market, and their popularity is well deserved. Instead of relying on standard headphone drivers, the Aftershokz, as this particular model is often affectionately called, delivers music through the cheekbones, leaving your ears completely open and allowing you to enjoy ambient sounds and notice hazards on the road before it’s too late.

Despite being packed with modern technology, the Aftershokz are remarkably lightweight and highly comfortable. The wraparound headband is both flexible and durable, and it will conform to the shape of your head regardless of whether you’re a big-boned strongman competitor or someone who still gets ID’ed in bars despite being closer to 30 than 20.

The Aftershokz are IP55-certified, which means they can survive sweat, dust, and moisture, and they feature something called PremiumPitch+ technology for an audiophile-grade audio experience, wide dynamic range, and rich bass. The headphones can last up to six hours of continuous playback on a charge, and that’s even when calling using the pair of noise canceling microphones that intelligently exclude surrounding noise and effectively enhance speech.

If you’re not scared to try something new, give the Aftershokz Trekz Titanium a chance; we promise you’ll not regret it.

4123Y3ntDKL

Plantronics BackBeat FIT

The Plantronics BackBeat FIT is highly recommended behind-the-neck Bluetooth headphones for all active people who don’t want to give up high-end sound quality when squatting heavy weights or conquering some impossible climb on a fixie.

The BackBeat FIT provides superior stability and listening comfort thanks to the unique, ergonomic ear tips, which are just as comfortable as foam ear tips, but last much longer and are water and dust resistant. Speaking of which, the entire headphones are IP57-certified, ensuring protection from immersion between 15 centimeters and 1 meter in depth and from limited dust ingress.

The sound of these headphones is tuned for voice, but even bass-heavy music doesn’t sound bad at all. Highs can sometimes be too harsh, but this issue occurs only with poorly mixed songs. Best of all, the BackBeat FIT block just the right amount of outside noise for you to enjoy whatever you’re currently listening to while always knowing exactly what’s happening around you.

Depending on how loud or quiet you like your music to be, the BackBeat FIT can last up to 8 hours on a charge thanks to the Deep Sleep hibernation mode, which activates when you’re out of range of your mobile device.

Urbanears Hellas

The Urbanears Hellas are not afraid of sweat because they feature meshy, washable ear cushions and headband, both of which can be easily removed, cleaned, and clipped back in. Besides their sweat-friendly design, they also feature a convenient touch interface that eliminates hunting for the right button to increase the volume or skip a song.

The meshy ear cushions don’t isolate too much noise, making the headphones perfect for biking and other activities that can be safely performed only when one is sufficiently aware of his or her surroundings. Even though you’ll definitely be able to tell precisely what’s going on around you, the surprisingly refined sound coming from the two large drives inside the well-ventilated earcups will take the central stage and motivate you to push yourself towards your goal.

Some owners of the Urbanears Hellas have reported connectivity issues, but that’s something that matters more on the device the headphones are connected to than on the headphones themselves. If you purchase from Amazon, you have nothing to worry about anyway because Amazon’s customer support will always take your side and do anything to help you solve your issues. This might mean giving you a full refund and allowing you to keep the headphones, which is great news considering the Urbanears Hellas is fairly priced.

31TYkfOKqNL

Jaybird X3

There’s a lot to like about the Jaybird X3, which is they are among the most popular Bluetooth headphones for biking. Jaybird designed the X3 to be as compact as possible without sacrificing performance and looks. The headphones are sweat-proof thanks to their hydrophobic nano-coating, which keeps moisture away from the sensitive components inside, and they have a long battery life of up to 8 hours.

The Jaybird X3 can be paired with the MySound app (available for iOS and Android). The app allows you to customize your EQ settings to your unique preferences. The settings are saved directly on the headphones, which means your customizations will carry across different playback devices. Apart from creating your own sound profiles, you can also download customized sound profiles from athletes or artists and experience how they like to listen to their favorite music.

At a price, the Jaybird X3 has surprised us with how many accessories come included in the box, and we were also surprised by their excellent build quality.

Thauker

The Thauker headphone is our bonus recommendation. They are much less expensive than all other headphones on this list, yet their sound quality, comfort, and build quality are all excellent. The Thauker headphone connects wirelessly via Bluetooth 4.1, they are IPX4-certified, and they last up to 8 hours on a charge.

What’s the catch? Compared to other headphones on this list, the Thauker block slightly too much outside noise for our liking. If you keep the volume down, you won’t run into any problems, but you might not be able to hear a honking car or a shouting pedestrian if you like to listen to your music at an ear-piercing volume level.

ProductBrandNamePrice
31TYkfOKqNL. SL500JaybirdJaybird X3 in-Ear Wireless Bluetooth Sports HeadphonesCheck Price on Amazon
31rZugw8bTL. SL500AftershokzAftershokz AS600IG Trekz Titanium Open Ear Wireless Bone Conduction Headphones, Ivy GreenCheck Price on Amazon
4123Y3ntDKL. SL500PlantronicsPlantronics BackBeat Fit Bluetooth Headphones - BlackCheck Price on Amazon
41P3YJAHQaL. SL500UrbanearsUrbanears Hellas On-Ear Active Wireless Bluetooth Headphones, Rush (4091226)Check Price on Amazon

* If you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. For more details, please visit our Privacy policy page.


Posts You Might Like

Leave a Comment